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Mai Thor’s post at Minnesota Daily would be utterly laughable if it weren’t so dangerous. Thor’s post concludes that requiring photo ID’s before voting is racist. Here’s the scariest part of Thor’s post:
Our Constitution affords us several rights, including the right to vote. It is unfortunate that many people, especially those who run our courts and make our laws, feel that voting is not a right, but minimize it to some sort of privilege, like having a bank account or going to the liquor store, where conditions and technicalities have to be met in order to participate.
There is no denying the race factor in the history of photo ID requirements. After the Civil War, the black vote was suppressed by poll taxes and literacy tests as well as other heinous laws known as Jim Crow. Proponents of photo IDs say it prevents voter fraud, when, in reality, voter fraud is an illusion which originated from an era of racism.
Photo IDs are the poll tax of present day America. Today, the group of individuals that are disenfranchised is much broader. Some of these individuals include seniors, low-income people and those who have disabilities.
Ms. Thor’s grasp of reality is faulty at best. First, let’s consider this article by WSJ’s John Fund:
Take the bill the GOP-controlled Legislature passed, which would require voters show a form of official ID or a utility bill; another bill would end Philadelphia’s bizarre practice of locating over 900 polling places in private venues, including bars, abandoned buildings and even the office of a local state senator. City officials admit their voter rolls are stuffed with phantoms. The city has about as many registered voters as it has adults, and is thus a rich breeding ground for fraud.
Let’s also examine this post by Stefan Sharkansky, in which Sharkansky quotes from a Washington Post op-ed by Michael Waldman and Justin Leavitt of the Brennan Center. Here’s one of Leavitt’s and Waldman’s assertions:
But the notion of widespread voter fraud, as these prosecutors found out, is itself a fraud. Firing a prosecutor for failing to find wide voter fraud is like firing a park ranger for failing to find Sasquatch. Where fraud exists, of course, it should be prosecuted and punished. (And politicians have been stuffing ballot boxes and buying votes since senators wore togas; Lyndon Johnson won a 1948 Senate race after his partisans famously “found” a box of votes well after the election.) Yet evidence of actual fraud by individual voters is painfully skimpy.
Here’s another assertion:
Before and after every close election, politicians and pundits proclaim: The dead are voting, foreigners are voting, people are voting twice. On closer examination, though, most such allegations don’t pan out.
Here’s Sharkansky’s reply:
During the 2004 election here, the dead voted, foreigners voted and people voted twice. What difference does it make if some, or even most, such allegations don’t pan out? Many cases of illegal voting have been exhaustively documented and corroborated with database records, ballot envelopes and other physical evidence, and election worker anecdotes. Enough in all to have conceivably changed the outcome of a gubernatorial election.
Other than the documented proof, the most stunning part of Sharkansky’s post is how much Leavitt’s and Waldman’s op-ed sounds like Thor’s. Leavitt’s and Waldman’s op-ed is titled “The Myth of Voter Fraud” while Thor only uses that sentence in her post.
Let’s re-examine the planned voter fraud here in Minnesota in 2004:
Among the well-funded and supposedly independent groups supporting John Kerry in the campaign is Americans Coming Together (ACT). ACT has taken notice of Minnesota’s special vulnerabilty to vote fraud and organized a sophisticated effort to exploit it in a manner that violates Minnesota law. In Minnesota the Bush campaign has come into the possession of the following email from ACT to its Minnesota volunteers:
Election Day is upon us. You are confirmed to volunteer with ACT (America Coming Together - http://www.actforvictory.org/) on Election Day, Tuesday, Nov 2.
We will be creating name badges that include your Ward and Precinct information for each of the thousands of volunteers that day to make it easier to find a volunteer to vouch for a voter at the polls.
I am emailing you to request your street address, city and zipcode. We’ve already got your other contact information, but your record in our database does not include this information.
You can save us time on election day by replying today to this email with this information, or give us a call at [phone number with St. Paul area code].
In order to get your badge correct, please reply by Thursday.
Thank you for your help and cooperation. See you on Election Day!
That’s before we get into ACORN’s voter fraud activities:
Four people have been indicted on charges of voter fraud in Kansas City, officials said Wednesday.
Investigators said questionable registration forms for new voters were collected by the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, a group that works to improve minority and low-income communities.
The four indicted, Kwaim A. Stenson, Dale D. Franklin, Stephanie L. Davis and Brian Gardner, were employed by ACORN as registration recruiters. They were each charged with two counts.
I did a little follow-up on these ACORN employees. Here’s what I found:
- Franklin pled guilty in February to filing false registration forms.
- Brian Gardner pleaded guilty in March, 2007.
- Kwaim Stenson will stand trial in July, 2008.
- Charges were dropped against Stephanie Davis when investigators found out that Carmen Davis stole Stephanie Davis’ identity. According to the article, Carmen Davis also goes by the name Latisha Reed.
Here’s one last interesting tidbit of information:
Carmen Davis, who also goes by the name Latisha Reed, was accused of using Stephanie Davis’s Social Security number while employed as a voter registration recruiter for ACORN in August and September of 2006. Ms. Davis/Reed allegedly caused three false registration applications, all in the name of the same person, but with different addresses, to be filed with the Kansas City Board of Election Commissioners.
Thor’s claims that voter fraud is a myth propagated by racists hoping to disenfranchise minority voters is the real myth. As you can see, there’s more than abundant proof of voter fraud convictions. That moves it beyond allegation. That makes it a finding of fact beyond a reasonable doubt. In fact, those people that pled guilty can’t even appeal their convictions.
Thor can spin it any way she wants but irrefutable facts are irrefutable facts.
One final thing: the Constitution gives every UNited States citizen the right to vote. It doesn’t give citizens the right to vote multiple times, nor does it give non-citizens living in the United States the right to vote. On that, the Constitution is extremely clear.
Cross-posted and comments welcome at Let Freedom Ring.
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